Mount Pleasant is a neighborhood in the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, stretching from Cambie Street to Clark Drive and from Great Northern Way and 2nd, to 16th and Kingsway. The neighbourhood, once characterized as working-class, has undergone a process of gentrification since the early 1990s, including the area around the Main Street and Broadway intersection.
Mount Pleasant is known as one of the more up and coming neighborhoods, especially in the communities surrounding Vancouver’s downtown peninsula. Many first-time homeowners and young professionals, as well as a growing number of families, call Mount Pleasant home. It is also home to a number of artists and writers, including CBC personalities Ian Hanomansing and Tod Maffin, The Tyee editor David Beers and documentary filmmaker Peter W. Klein.
Mount Pleasant owes much of its origins to a former stream and, because of it, developed much of its unique and rich character. The stream attracted a number of breweries from 1888 to 1912, hence it became known as Brewery Creek. In 1890, the first street cars arrived; as far south as 1st and Main. Brewery Creek, in conjunction with the connecting routes of Main and Kingsway, became the centre of industry and commercialism for the district of Mt. Pleasant. By 1897, there was a substantial population growth centred on Broadway and Main Street. The ability to commute to the City Centre and the industries of Brewery Creek and False Creek provided the draw for many working families that now populated the area below Broadway. In a sense, Mount Pleasant can be called Vancouver’s “first suburb”.
The area high above False Creek was named “Mount Pleasant” in 1888, after the Irish birthplace of Jane Fortune Kemp the wife of Henry Valentine Edmonds. Edmonds, clerk of the municipal council in New Westminster, was the original owner of much of Mount Pleasant.
Home, Vancouver, Canada
This is the entrance to the back-alley of 12th street, entering from Yukon street, just opposite of city hall. Our house, or my parking lot, would be behind the first line trees. If you look closely you can see Edward sitting in his usual spot.
Barry and Harry
Housing in Vancouver is ridiculously expensive, to to afford the nice home on 12th and Yukon a housemate was necessary, Harry from Australia. Nice and friendly and easy to deal with. He tolerated me and Brandon staying for the month and even didn’t say a bad word for the whole time that I stayed after. Gwen the landlord-lady never met Harry before. She came to the house a lot, at least 2 times a week, but it must have always been during Harry’s working hours. So when she saw someone hanging out with Dustin and Barbara all the time she figured it couldn’t be anyone else but their housemate Harry. I played along, mainly not to blow my cover of living in the parking lot behind the house, answering questions about work and things she wanted to know. Quite funny, the Asian community in Vancouver is very ambitious and hard working, so most beginnings of the conversations we had revolved around work and then, more specifically, why I wasn’t at work. I would come up with excuses or make up a story to satisfy the old ladies hunger for gossip. This went on for about a good 2-3 months until move-out day came along and Harry was present, too. After Gwen talked to him, she came over to me and said “you no Harry” (imagine an old Chinese lady’s English accent) I had kinda waited and prepared myself for this moment, so after trying to look as confused as possible I said: „Gwen, I am not Harry, my name is Barry“ with all the seriousness having to try hard not to burst into laughter. She was very confused and asked why I would answer questions about his work and questions about moving out. Things got a little more tricky towards the end of our conversations, more than just work-related questions) I played along and said that I was confused too and didn’t really understand either, but was just trying to be friendly. That was that, she must have figured it out in the end, but it was definitely fun while it lasted.
Typical, Vancouver, Canada
Even though Mt. Pleasant was quite close to the center, or the CBD, with all its glassy skyscrapers, you wouldn’t notice it in the suburbs. Little wooden houses, small streets, surrounded by lots of green spaces and in general very natural.
The shed
The previous tenants installed a metal shed in the yard, to store things like garden materials. Once they moved out they handed it to their neighbors, giving them a place to store their bikes. The shed happened to be right in front of the Werbeski’s backdoor, it made the retarded dog, Rocco, bark every time someone would enter it. One day, in order to make Barbara more happy (I think that’s why we did it) we moved the shed to the other side of the yard. We didn’t ask for permission and the move itself turned out to be quite tricky, very tight spaces and a big, fragile shed. We damaged it a bit, but overall we were quite successful. It would’ve been impossible to put it back in its old place without a lot of effort. Once done we couldn’t stop laughing at how funny this shady operation was and didn’t care at all for any consequences.
Of course the landlord Gwen didn’t like what we did so we got into a bit of trouble, but argued that we were not using the shed and it would wake the dog up whenever someone would get something in or out. After a long back and forth and us ignoring Gwen’s wishes, we put it into a different place on the last day.
Stepping out of the alley, Vancouver, Canada
This was the view I would get every time I stepped out of the alley, about a 200m walk from my car towards city hall. The great thing was, it looked different every time. Having 4 layers, our side of the city, the CBD, north and west Vancouver and the mountains in the background. Sometimes only the foreground was visible, sometime the city would be in the clouds, sometimes fog everywhere with the mountain tops peaking out. One thing was for sure it never disappointed.
